A model Hacker boat is displayed in a glass case during a press conference where Hacker Boat announced plans to relocate from smaller Ticonderoga facility to Queensbury Business Park on in Queensbury, N.Y. (Lori Van Buren / Times Union)

A luxury boat maker is moving ahead with plans for a new manufacturing and sales facility in Queensbury to replace its current plant in Ticonderoga.

The town Planning Board was expected Tuesday to hear plans from Hacker Boat Co. for a $3 million, 90,000-square-foot facility on 17 acres in the Queensbury Business Park. The plant, showroom and offices would be more than twice the size of Hacker's current boat repair and restoration operation.

Built in a shop along Lake George since the late 1950s, sleek, powerful mahogany Hacker Craft boats have been a favorite of the rich and famous going back nearly a century. A 30-foot runabout can cost $125,000 and up, and today's clients include fashion designer Tommy Hilfiger, celebrity chef Rachael Ray and actor Donald Sutherland.

Mike Doud, director of business development for Overseas Lease Group, Hacker's parent company, said construction of the new plant could start later this summer or in early fall, depending on when planning approval is received. While conditional approval might happen tonight, he said, because of questions from the town's consulting engineers, final approval might not happen until next month's board meeting.

If construction starts when anticipated, Doud said the building could be done by March 2015. The closing of the Ticonderoga facility would be tied to the opening of the new location.

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Luxury boat maker presses Queensbury move

Workers there would be offered the option to continue their jobs in Queensbury, said company spokesman Ken Rawley. The company will continue to operate its marina at Silver Bay on Lake George.

The company expects the new plant will be used to start building a new type of vessel, a tender for luxury yachts. The company recently did a 33-foot tender for the owners of the German-made 242-foot mega-yacht Odessa II.

"This is a new market for us," said Rawley.

A long-standing legal challenge over ownership of Hacker remains in court, Rawley added, but it is not expected to impact the move to Queensbury.

Company owner Bill Morgan died in early 2012 in the midst of a dispute with former speedboat racer Robert Lynn Wagemann, stemming from a falling-out over a 2004 agreement Morgan made to sell Wagemann his businesses, Hacker Craft and Morgan Marine. Neither man used a lawyer to craft the agreement.

Wagemann sued Morgan in September 2009, claiming breach of contract, after Morgan refused to sign over titles to the company real estate. Morgan insisted Wagemann had not lived up to conditions of the sale and was "improperly using the trade marks and trade name of Hacker."

Wagemann transferred his interest in Hacker Craft in August 2011 to New Jersey investor George Badcock, through his company, Erin Investments. Badcock is now Hacker president and CEO, and Erin Investments was added to the lawsuit in November 2012.

Morgan never married or had children, and his estate, which is continuing the lawsuit, includes relatives from out of state. Attempts to reach John Sylvestri, a Chestertown lawyer who represented Morgan and, now, his estate, were not successful.